Sep 16, 2012

It's Not Just Walker and the DOA; Chief Erwin Is Out of Line

Update: It's 2013 and Erwin is still sending out three police officers, with two squads, to people's houses for the charge of having sung a song at the state capitol; and then named another song. Erwin is a disgrace and a hack for Scott Walker. Sarah Jones has the story.---Capitol Police Chief David Erwin is a problem, and being silent and averting our gaze towards Scott Walker is no solution, as our friend John Nichols has advised.

"Our men and women of the [Capitol Police] Department serve not only as police officers but as ambassadors at the seat of Wisconsin's government," writes Chief Erwin on the Capitol website. "... Please contact us if there is any matter with which we may assist you."

Ambassadors? Let's put that aside. There are matters pertaining to your conduct as Chief at our Capitol that require your personal assistance and a conversation.

Chief Erwin, time for a public Q and A, or a private chat with me, if your inclination and time permit. I can be reached at: malleon@live.com.

In the past three weeks, a number of Wisconsin Kossacks, including me, have been documenting the abuses being perpetrated by Wisconsin Capitol Police officers upon peaceful citizens protesting in the state Capitol. Those abuses have been orchestrated by the new Capitol Police Chief, David Erwin. Chief Erwin has also launched a media attack against those same peaceful protesters alleging all kinds of wild behavior.

On September 10th, he suggested that sign-holders and singers have been "terrorizing" staffers, legislators, and visitors, without giving any specifics. His officers have made dozens of arrests of "regular protesters" in the past few weeks, none of them for anything other than holding signs, draping banners over the rotunda, and failing to get a permit to sing If I Had a Hammer inside the building. You would think with all this terrorism and intimidation going on, we would have seen people arrested for something serious. Instead, people are being charged with violating obscure sections of the administrative code dealing with hazardous materials and heavy machinery left in the hallway.

The chief even said that people holding signs hurled insults at Red Cross volunteers at a blood drive being held on the opposite side of the rotunda one day. I didn't see anything like that while I was there but surely, with all the cops and video cameras they had swarming around the protesters that day, they arrested someone for that, right? That seems like a fairly straightforward violation, right? Easy to prosecute, got it all on video. Uhhh...no. Instead,they arrested people for holding up T-shirts they had received from Muslims for Life, an organization that encourages blood donations that had a display next to the blood drive that day. If he weren't a Chief, I'd swear he made the whole thing up.

So you might be asking why? What's the Chief trying to accomplish? Here's my theory, but keep in mind I've never met the Chief. Unlike his predecessor, he doesn't talk to regular people. I think the Chief keeps pursuing this ridiculous strategy of manufacturing tales of terrorism in the building while harassing peaceful protesters because he comes from a military background, then served in the State Patrol before becoming Chief of the Capitol Police. Citizens with loud mouths aren't citizens, they're just maggots that need to be broken down, and when they refuse to be broken down, he needs to teach them a lesson. When they still won't obey orders, they become the enemy. That's my theory, anyway.

He also can't wrap his head around the idea that there are no leaders among us. He is attempting, like a good military strategist, to cut the head off the snake, but what he sees as a snake is just a song circle. There is no head or tail. Like a neighborhood pick-up basketball game, there is no formal structure. Everyone knows that if they show up in the Capitol from noon to one weekdays, there will probably be people there singing. That's all it is.

The people who bring signs or chalk the sidewalk? They are just citizens who oppose the policies of the current administration. Some of them sing along while they hold their signs, but there's no plot, no secret funding, no terrorist organization, no political party, no roster, no dues, no clubhouse, no secret handshake, no marching orders, no union bosses, not even a meeting. People are just pissed off.

Yes, believe it or not, when the government strips basic rights from large classes of people, when they "drop the bomb" on public workers, when they admit they advocate the use of violence to break up peaceful protests, when they pass laws suppressing voting rights in a democracy, and when they openly mock and dehumanize 48 percent of the people or refuse to even have a conversation with legislators in the minority party, citizens don't like it. Shocking, isn't it? The Capitol rotunda was designed as a public forum, so when citizens in Wisconsin have an urge to petition their government, that's where they go, just like they go to the playground when they have the urge to play basketball.

A reporter from a local paper asked me on Friday what I thought the "strategy" of the Solidarity Sing Along was going to be now that Chief Erwin had made these aggressive moves against protesters. "I can only speak for myself, but probably show up on Monday and sing for an hour," was my answer. There was an awkward pause, like he expected more, but there is no more. There is no "they" there.

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Michael Leon

Michael Leon is a writer living in Madison, Wisconsin. His reporting has been recognized by the Wisconsin Newspaper Association. Leon's writing has appeared nationally in The Progressive, The Advocate, In These Times, CounterPunch and The Champion—the journal of the National Association of Criminal Defense Lawyers, and locally in the Isthmus, the Capital Times and the Fitchburg Star. Leon works as a writer, editor, veterans' advocate, and public relations consultant.